The Real Mc-Koi

Get your garden off to a swimming start with these beautiful and tranquil Koi fish. Bred as breathtaking creatures for over 150 years, Koi have the ability to recognize their owners, ring a bell for food and live for over 30 years.

Each Koi, with its own pair of steel and wood bases for mounting indoors or outside, is painstakingly handcrafted by artist Tyson Weiss in his Maine studio with the intention of capturing the peaceful fluid presence of schooling Koi fish.

Made from durable stoneware clay with a pigmented silica glaze, these Koi shed water and are both heat and cold resistant. They look even more majestic when grouped together in a school or used as markers leading guests down a garden path. Don't have a garden? The interior stand on these fish makes them perfectly at home on your mantle, shelf or table.

Due to the handmade nature of these items, each is one-of-a-kind and will vary slightly.

Sold individually.

Unfortunately, this item cannot ship outside of the United States at this time.

details

Handmade

Item ID

19176

Made from

reclaimed steel,
stoneware,
wood

Measurements

Each fish approx. 15" L x 7" H x 5" D; 5 lbs.

Notes

Clean with damp cloth. Each Koi includes two stands (as shown in the additional images underneath the main image): a desktop stand (with white base) for indoor use, and a stake for outdoor use. The bottom of the fish has a large opening so that it can be placed to balance on the wooden platforms of each stand.

the maker

Tyson Weiss

Weiss admits he has been captivated by the concept of fish being part of a garden setting for a long time. Combining his talent for working with clay and his landscaping expertise was only natural.

"Ceramics has a lot of conceptual parallels with stone masonry," Weiss said of how his two passions have merged. "Actually I came up with the concept of the fish when I was 19. I had a ceramics teacher who had us keep a pottery journal of ideas. It was just a simple pencil sketch on the corner of a page. But the fish in the garden idea really clicked when I was on my first snorkeling trip in Belize. There was an underwater reef landscape with schools of colorful fish collectively making sinuous curves navigating among the tree and shrub-like coral structures, and I said to myself, 'This is it!' And now I am just trying to bring that incredible beauty, this visual sensation of 'flow' into gardens and interiors."

Because the fish are usually used in multiples of three or more, they actually become one much larger sculptural piece--a school of fish within the garden. And unlike a static sculpture, the school of fish actually appears to be moving through the landscape. They appear to have momentum which can direct the garden visitor along garden paths.

"Their 'flow' implies water and brings that water quality, that aesthetic to any landscape or interior." Weiss said.